The original femtocell value proposition - the mobile subscriber pays to buy and install the femtocell at her home and also provides the backhaul using her ISP, to get better cell coverage that she's already paying for, is a bit flawed and it's not surprising that femtocells haven't taken the world by storm.

That said, smaller cells, and lots of them, will be needed to provide quality of service in densely populated environments. But carriers will probably have make the initial investment to pay for them.

It may be early days for outdoor small cell development, but the demand has been there for quite some time. And, in the future, the demand will only continue to grow as beefier public and business devices become accustomed to the additional support that they bring. We can expect small cells to become a more ubiquitous part of the device ecosystem.

In conjunction with unveiling of EE Times’ Silicon 60 list, journalist & Silicon 60 researcher Peter Clarke hosts a conversation on startups in the electronics industry. One of Silicon Valley's great contributions to the world has been the demonstration of how the application of entrepreneurship and venture capital to electronics and semiconductor hardware can create wealth with developments in semiconductors, displays, design automation, MEMS and across the breadth of hardware developments. But in recent years concerns have been raised that traditional venture capital has turned its back on hardware-related startups in favor of software and Internet applications and services. Panelists from incubators join Peter Clarke in debate.